Blood of Honour

‘What?’ snarled Tanner. ‘What’s going on?’ He saw Alopex lower his knife.

‘We are finished here,’ the kapitan muttered, ‘for now.’ He dabbed at his eye again, then put his knife away. Tanner lowered his bayonet, dropped the rock he was clasping and put his hand to his head, reaching to the tree for support. Alopex and his men pushed past, scrambled over the rocks and went back towards the cave.

‘Are you all right?’ Sykes said. ‘I’m sorry – I couldn’t help you much.’

‘You got him off me to start with. Bastard might really have killed me if it weren’t for that.’ He breathed out heavily. ‘Bloody hell. That hurt.’ He sheathed his bayonet and slumped to the ground.

‘I wonder what the fuss is about,’ said Sykes, looking towards the cave.

‘Christ knows,’ said Tanner. ‘But I need a beadie.’ He felt for his cigarettes, took one out and lit it.

Suddenly they heard a guttural roar of pain and anguish from the cave.

‘That don’t sound good,’ said Sykes.

Tanner eased himself back to his feet, gasping with pain as he did so. ‘No, Stan. Come on, we’d better see what’s going on.’

Clambering back round the rocky spur to the cave, pain shooting through Tanner with every step, they saw Alopex clutching his head, rocking back and forth, then striding away from the others, his face turned to the sky. Alarm now struck Tanner. Alexis, he thought. He hoped it was not so.

‘Christ, what happened to you?’ said Peploe, as he and Vaughan hurried over.

‘Nothing, sir. What’s going on?’

‘It’s bad, I’m afraid,’ said Vaughan. ‘The Germans have torched Sarhos and taken away Alopex’s wife, son and sister.’

Tanner clutched his head. ‘Let me think,’ he said, to himself as much as to anyone else. He drew on his cigarette, then flicked the butt away. ‘Did they take anyone else or only those three?’

‘Only those three. The rest they left locked in the church.’

‘Then they’ll be safe,’ he said. ‘They’re trying to get Alopex out of the mountains. Let me talk to him.’ He turned, but Peploe caught him by his shoulder.

‘Jack, wait.’ Tanner stopped and faced him. ‘You and Alopex – you’ve just been fighting again?’

Tanner nodded. ‘He came at me, sir. I’ve been trying to keep out of his way.’

‘Jack, that’s not good enough. This has to stop. Apologise to him.’

‘Sir,’ said Tanner. ‘I’ve nothing to apologise for.’

‘Tanner,’ said Vaughan, ‘that might be so, but this is Alopex’s country – Alopex’s land. You are a problem to him, because for him to back down would mean him losing face. That is more damaging to him than to you. We need him – we need these kapitans to help continue the fight.’

‘Jack, I’m sorry. I know you have your pride, but I want you to end this now. Apologise to Alopex. That’s an order.’

Tanner looked away, then wiped the blood from his face. ‘An order?’

‘Yes.’

Tanner swallowed, sighed and nodded. Satanas was now with Alopex, an avuncular arm around the younger kapitan’s shoulder.

‘Alopex,’ said Tanner, approaching him.

Alopex turned, a look of pure hatred in his eyes.

‘I—’ He stopped, paused, briefly closed his eyes, then said, ‘I apologize. I offended you, and I’m sorry. And I’m also very sorry to hear of your loss.’ Alopex stared at him, as though not comprehending what he was hearing. Slowly Tanner held out his hand.

‘Alopex,’ Satanas said. ‘Enough of this. Take his hand.’

Silently Alopex did so.

Tanner smiled, aware of a weight lifting from his shoulders. ‘I want to say something to you,’ he said. ‘Your wife and son and Alexis, they’ll be safe.’

‘They will kill them,’ murmured Alopex.

‘No – no, they won’t. Think about it. Why have they only taken those three?’

Alopex looked at him blankly.

‘Because they’re trying to lure you out of the mountains. It’s you they’re after – a kapitan, a resistance leader.’

‘But how do they know of me?’

‘I don’t know – someone must have talked. Maybe they’ve rounded up people in Heraklion, tortured them. It could have been anyone, but they know. Why else would they go to your village and take your family?’

Satanas spoke to Alopex. ‘I think you are right,’ he then said to Tanner.

‘It’s a trap,’ said Tanner. ‘They’ll be expecting you to attack in force, I’m sure. But that’s not the way. Let us help you. We’ll get them back for you.’

‘But how?’

Tanner shrugged. ‘Someone will know where they are. Do you still have people inside the town?’

‘Of course.’

‘Then we can find out where they are. We’ll watch and wait and then we’ll make a plan and rescue them. If we work together, we can do this.’

Alopex nodded. ‘Yes, we must try.’ He laid a hand on Tanner’s shoulder. ‘I accept your apology. We will work together. Our feud – it is over.’

‘We will get them back.’

Alopex buried his head in his hands.

Tanner left him and walked towards the mouth of the cave, the enormity of what he had pledged now registering. He’d said it not for Alopex, but for Alexis and, he realized, because of his own misplaced sense of pride. Not only did they have to discover the prisoners’ whereabouts, they had to defy the rapidly massing German troops now flooding into Heraklion, then get Alopex’s family out and safely up into the mountains. It was, Tanner knew, with a rapidly sinking heart, a very tall order indeed.

18

Some forty miles away as the crow flew, but many more by foot, the main British evacuation was still under way. More than six thousand troops had been lifted from the tiny southern port of Sfakia on the night of 29 May. German mountain troops had dogged their retreat all the way, but as the exhausted troops of Creforce neared the coast at last, the landscape had helped them. The mountain passes had descended into a high plateau of lush meadows and groves, but from this plain ran a narrow, deep and craggy ravine, which was the only real passage to the coast and easy to defend; the Imbros Gorge had bought precious time for the mass of Creforce now waiting to be picked up on the shore beyond.

At the end of the gorge the road on which the men had been travelling finally reached a dead end. From high on a rocky headland overlooking the sea there was only one way down to Sfakia and that was by a narrow path. The signs of retreat were everywhere: trucks, cars, even a few light tanks lay abandoned, their engines deliberately wrecked. Everything too difficult or heavy to be carried down to the port lay scattered and discarded.

All the way from the bluff to the sea, men huddled in the rocks, waiting and praying that they might have a chance to leave. Major General Freyberg had made his way through the mass after he and most of his staff had finally left their cave headquarters beneath the bluff that evening, 30 May. Young men who, just ten days earlier, had looked fit, confident and brimming with youthful determination, were now haggard, dirty and unshaven, their uniforms torn and filthy. They were hungry and, above all, thirsty – damn it, who wasn’t in this heat? – but there was nothing he could do for them. Before leaving, he had sent one last signal to General Wavell, urging him to do all that was possible to send more ships, but he knew that, while he would shortly be leaving the island, many of his gallant men would not. They had fought their hardest, lost friends and comrades and now faced an uncertain future as prisoners of war.

Not for the first time since the battle had begun, Freyberg wished he could have been a mere company